Horze wrote:However much certain elements of the sport are despised, if you decide to change too much you could end up with discipline which is totally unrecognizable and with historical disjoint. Who wants that?
The sport evolves but not change abruptly.
I would argue that 95% of the people miss the evolution of anything because it's to slow, The UCI missed radios, GPS tracking, drugs, helmets, DI2, TV coverage and frame changes in the hour record. (from what I saw in that thread you would have to be a fool to attempt it, the rules sound like the USA tax laws) . History of sports in the long run is worthless, improvement in all aspects of life made it purely academic.
Horze wrote:From a purely objective perspective it's precisely these parameters which keep specifications in check. If regulation is removed, who knows what manner of equipment we could have, for good or for ill. And if a new direction is taken there is no going back. Bringing with it high likelihood of potential problems which are irreversible because they are untried and untested.
The beauty of engineering a bicycle is you can see a finished product relatively quickly with all the technology that;s put inside it. There is nothing truly holding industry back. The industry works according to given specification with which to innovate. You change the spec, you change the product.
"joking (I KNOW) we wound be on Lotus super bikes". Seriously you can see that some new directions have been taken and you can go back. Mavic factory wheels have not stopped old school 32 spoke wheels, BB30 and it's family of bottom brackets haven't killed square taper yet and fancy carbon frames haven't put Richard Sachs and Dario Pegoretti out of business ( given that they are special cases but NAHBS is bigger than ever.) DI2 is not going to kill cable shifting in the next 10 years.
In this day of internet reviews, if products are sub standard, it's your fault for buying it. You can be an expert in anything you want, as fast as you can read. It's forcing manufactures to explain why and how the build thing and the trade off they make, take the Cervelo RCA, First Watt amps, Apple and organic foods. Why would you buy anything that you are not 100% sure will meet your needs. Can't remember the last time I had a bad meal at a restaurant thanks to yelp, chowhound and million other sites.
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